Why both sexes fib about how many lovers they've hadApr 2 2008 By Brian Mciver, Daily Record Newspaper, Scotland

WHEN it comes to sex, there's one thing both men and women tend to lie about - how many lovers they've had.

The only difference is the guys tend to exaggerate their conquests, while the ladies downplay their pasts.

The issue was highlighted yesterday when Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg admitted to having had sex with "no more than 30" different people in his life.

The married politician, 41, discussed his sexual past in an interview with GQ magazine.

And while he refused to name his number of conquests, the statement has raised the subject of what people will admit to when it comes to their sexual history.

The average number of partners for Britons is 9.55 in their lifetime. But it varies dramatically between men and women, with guys averaging 13, while women admit to seven.

And, interestingly, the number of sexual partners is on the decrease, with a survey in 2006 revealing that the average number of UK partners has decreased from 9.6 in 2002, to 9.55 in 2006.

According to experts, men inflate their tally out of a sense of machismo and wanting to be seen as a stud, while women reduce their number because they are reluctant to admit their complete history in view of how society would judge their moral behaviour.

And while some people are happy to discuss their past, even if they do lie, Record agony aunt Joan Burnie says that if you are in a relationship, you should never ask your other half what their number is.

She said: "It is very destructive to bring this up, what does it matter?

"What somebody did before they met you is not your business, as long as they've taken sensible precautions.

"Some people get very hung up on previous lovers, to the extent they want to know exactly what they did and if others were better.

"Men do exaggerate and there is a double standard in that some men think it's OK for them and their sons to sow their wild oats.While women should wait until they turn up like Prince Charming but the world is not like that.

"People go through different phases in their life. It's not a numbers game. It's what you do in a relationship that matters, not what you did before.

"People don't want to know and the phrase, 'Don't ask, don't tell,' applies because unless you're very, very young, you have to accept the other person has been with someone before you and just get over it."

The issue of sexual partners is one of the most talked about subjects among friends. But while relationships experts believe couples should not discuss their past and their numbers, the chances are the figures will always be wrong anyway.

All studies into partners show a huge discrepancy between the figures admitted by men and women. And the generally accepted pattern is the Rule of Three, as made famous in the hit movie American Pie 2.

In the film, bad boy Stifler says: "When a girl tells you how many guys she's slept with, multiply it by three and that's the real number.

"If a guy tells you how many girls he's hooked up with, it's not even close to that. You take that number and divide it by three, then you get the real total. The Rule of Three. It's an exact science."

A more academic explanation, from researchers at the Carolina Population Centre in the US, concluded: "In populationbased surveys on sexual behaviour, men consistently report higher numbers of sexual partners than women, which may be associated with male exaggeration or with female under-reporting."

However, psychologist Norman Brown, of the University of Michigan, believes there may be less deceitful reasons for the discrepancies.

"Women are more likely to rely on enumeration," said Brown. "They tend to say, 'I just know,' and if you ask them to explain how they know, they say, 'Well, there was John, Tom, etc.' "This is a strategy that typically leads to underestimation. Men are twice as likely to use rough approximation to answer the question.

I have been with 2, but they both were one of the brothers of sextuplets...oh, from different families of course, not that they were brothers of each other...and I knew they both played the switcheroo HA! sooooooooo...actually ..depending on...how many switcheroooosssssssssss there were to play on me...well you guess...hmm

And I'm still unhappy. So what does that tell you about fucking around? Either you make your bed--so to speak--with the slut-like nature of your existence, or you make peace with it and hope that you find someone as fucked up as you are to try to make something better...